Benefits of Parenting: excuses, excuses

I’m beginning to think this Poop feature will someday be used as propaganda by nations and groups trying to encourage people to have babies. (Though I personally think you might be able to do that most effectively by selling the baby-making component.) As I thought more about the pros of being a parent, it turns out I could basically use my child as a tool to get whatever I want in life. “My child commands that you give me your purse right now.” But my number one use for the child is that she is my go-to excuse for a whole lotta of bad behavior.

creativemag.com

It’s for my daughter …

Until my kid is old enough to go out and earn us some money, I make her earn her keep as a reason for late entrance and early exit at social events. The late thing worked better when she was an infant, but I can still use it in a pinch from time to time. I race into the restaurant where my friends have been waiting for fifteen minutes. “Oh, I’m so sorry I’m late. You know, the kid spilled an entire carton of milk on the couch just as I was heading out the door…” When she was younger, we had, “the baby exploded in her diaper and I had to change her.” Believe me, these kinds of lines work far better than, “I zoned out watching my latest Tivo-ed episode of ‘American Gladiator’ and just lost track of time. Ooops!”

Even better than the tardiness pass is the child-as-reason-for-early-exit. “No, really, we’ve had a blast watching the video of home birth, but we have to get home because we promised the sitter we’d be back by 9.” One of the best things about the kid excuse is that you can use it even when you have the child with you. “Oh, she’s exhausted, we really must take her home and get her in bed,” daring anyone to question why our child’s bedtime is around 4pm.

And actually, the kid is a perfect excuse for not showing up at all. “We couldn’t find childcare, otherwise we’d love to be at your candle party.” Had I known how much I could get out of just by procreating, I probably would have had a baby in my early 20s. In fact, I could probably turn a profit just by renting her out to my childless friends who have been invited to a wedding in Minnesota.

When my little one was a baby, I probably could have gotten away with wearing sweats to a royal coronation, because who in their right mind would expect a new mom to dress up and look presentable? Our house is littered with Cheerios and dirty laundry because of the kid. I think these excuses work well because there’s loads of truth to them — it is hard to attend to home and personal hygiene once you have spawned — so if you have to tolerate a messier lifestyle, you may as well get some mileage out of it.

As I sit in my filthy home in my oldest tracksuit, listening to the Toto song “I downloaded because my daughter likes it” and eating the Pokemon macaroni and cheese I buy for her, I smile. You know, I’d count my blessings, but my memory went away when I had a child. That’s also why I won’t be able to return any calls today. Hey, having a child changes you. And if it happens to make you into a flaky Oscar Madison with an affinity for cheesy music and faux-cheese edibles, then you work that until the kid goes off to college.